It’s been a little while I wrote a solo article. I’ve been having a mini vacation while at the same time submitting superior Lantern builds and beating Hypefox at his own article. Vote for me in his poll. It’ll be awesome.
In the meantime I attended War of the Light month 3 at Comics N’ More. I sat next to HypeFox as he pulled the only entity… again. Between that and my round one battle (which was the slowest game of HeroClix I ever played – Lost 0 points to 40) I just didn’t have the heart to write the month 3 battle report. The one good part of that was that I got experience playing Sodam Yat. On my team, he wasn’t KOed the whole tournament. Unfortunately, opponents kept knocking him to his 9 attack value click and ignoring him. A trick I would remember.
This is what War of the Light Month 3 looked like for me.
Gamers Gauntlet in Clinton Township is not my usual venue, but I thought it would be nice to try for a change. Turns out there are some great guys there. I’m still loyal to my regular venue, but I wouldn’t hesitate to go back to Gamer’s Gauntlet again. Special thanks to Dan for letting me borrow his White Battery and constructs when I came with none of my own. [EDITOR’S NOTE: Seriously? You forgot your Power Battery again? My God, man!]
LOCAL TOURNAMENT REPORT!!
The Format: Each participant is given 1 boosters of the limited edition War of Light DC Heroclix wave 2 set and another of a recent set. From the figures contained within the two boosters, competitors must make the best 400 Point army they can and compete in 3 Rounds of competitive play. You can also include standard objects and any war of the light constructs and resources you’ve acquired so far.
What I Opened:
SLOSH002 Saturn Girl
SLOSH007 Shrinking Violet
SLOSH028 Lightray
SLOSH034 Starman
SLOSH046 Superboy
WOL006 Star Sapphire Recruit
WOL014 Rankorr
WOL022 Katma Tui
WOL024 Saarek
WOL036 Bleez
My Jujitsu works on Ion. That’s right… I’m a ninja.
What I Played:
SLOSH007 Shrinking Violet
SLOSH034 Starman
SLOSH046 Superboy
WOLR101 Power Battery (White Lantern Corps)
WOLR306 Star Sapphire Ring
WOLR201.05 Crossbow (White)
WOLR201.06 Decoy (White)
WOLR201.07 Catapult (White)
WOLR201.08 Scissors (White)
WOLR201.09 Nurse (White)
That’s right I went to a War of the Light event and played a SLOSH team. The team abilities were just too good to pass up. Shrinking violet could share her 19 defense using by copying Starman’s JSA Team Ability OR she could Outwit through Stealth using the Superman TA. Having a team with 19 base defense across the board in sealed doesn’t happen very often. Starman also has an exceptional defensive abilities. Add in shared Willpower from Superboy, and then everyone gets Shape Change and Mystics from the Battery when I use the Star Sapphires ring (which, as far as War of Light rings go, is severely underrated). This team would be considered “great” in constructed and I was playing sealed. I’d hate to be facing it.
Fun fact: You can render Medusa powerless with a Gallon of Conditioner.
Round 1 versus WOL026 Sodam Yat, GOTG039 Medusa, and a WOL002 Red Lantern Recruit. I won map roll and we played on the Black Mercy Map. That meant there was no elevated and no blocking terrain to hide behind. My Range focused team had a huge advantage. I don’t remember all of the details of this match, but I do remember the ending. I had KOed everyone but Sodam Yat and surrounded him with my team. Between my Shape Change and his Decoy and Impervious the game ended up looking like we were playing dice masters. I counted at least 6 turns going by with no one able to land an attack even though everyone was based. We just started rushing through turns and they lasted 20 seconds each. The game still almost went to time. It was ridiculous.
She was secretly in the final running to become the new Captain America.
Round 2 versus SLOSH033 Stargirl possessed by ION, WOL030A Guy Gardner (Star Sapphires), WOL038 Dex-Starr, WOL002 Red Lantern Recruit, WOL006 Star Sapphire Recruit. We played on the same Black Mercy map that gave my team a huge advantage in round one. I moved up the board unafraid and my opponent was almost completely unable to hit my defense. I started off by hitting the Red Lantern Recruit from Range not wanting to face his penetrating Pois0n. Next I outwitted the special power on Guy Gardner and the Star Saphire Recruit so I didn’t take Mystics damage. I was then able to pick them off at will. As much as my opponent was missing me I also couldn’t touch his remaining characters. Dex-Starr had two Unoutwittable defensive abilities and Stargirl usually had Unoutwittable Impervious and Energy Shield Deflection.
I still hadn’t taken any damage up to that point and then Dex-Starr Pushed to hit for 2 on Starman. Thankfully that was the exact opening that I needed. Starman got Pulse Wave after being hit. The next turn I moved all my characters away and used Pulse Wave to KO Dex-Starr. I had done 4 damage to Stargirl and I was aiming for the kill on the following turn when the judge called time.
In one form or another I ended up fighting this guy all night.
Round 3 versus WOL026 Sodam Yat, WOL016 Soranik Natu, a Green Battery, various constructs, and a green ring. This turned out to be a really good game. No more Black Mercy map. This map had elevated to block my LoF. I started off by moving to the middle of the map and putting the crossbow on Superboy. My opponent used TK to move up Sodam Yat. Sodam then activated Charge, grabbed and Ultra-heavy object, and KOed Shrinking Violet just that fast. My remaining two characters had Running shot so I took two shots at Sodam Yat. Unfortunately the Shield and the ring combined to give him +3 to his ranged defense and I missed. He assigned the Decoy to Soranik and cleared Sodam. I assigned the Nurse to Starman and cleared. He charged and attacked Starman and missed. Starman’s trait added another token to him (awesome). On my turn I hit him for 2 damage with Starman and knocked him to click 3. He cleared. On my turn again Superboy missed again and Starman knocked him to Click 5. On his turn he activated Hypersonic, hit Starman for 3, took a Mystics damage, and ran Soranik away. We all cleared on the next turns. I used the Nurse to Regen Starman for 2. Seeing that I could heal to full, my opponent used Hypersonic and ran back to attack Starman. He missed and this time the second token gave him a pushing damage.
We each continued to damage our respective Lanterns by using powers and soon we each got each other’s Batteries to the end of the dials. I was on click 19 he was on click 20. Suddenly all of the stats on the characters in play went up by +2 or +3. The rest of the game went fairly quickly after that. Sodam Yat took a couple of hits right away and was on his last click. He couldn’t KO Starman without be KOed by mystics damage so he ran. I went after Soranik. She did 6 damage to Superboy, but he only took three due to invincible. Soranik was KOed the next turn. Sodam Yat tried to KO my power battery to even the odds. Unfortunately the power battery takes printed damage minus 2. In this case it was only one damage. It survived. The following turn Superboy KOed Sodam Yat with a running shot.
Conclusion: I won all of my matches, but I actually took second place on points. Thankfully, that was still enough to earn WOL112 Atrocitus.
What I Learned:
- Anyone with a star rod is awesome. I mean SLOSH034 Starman and SLOSH033 Stargirl. Star-lord doesn’t count. Both had Traited defenses that were just killer in the games I played tonight. Stargirl was helped a lot by being possessed by Ion, but it seemed like she is able to add energy shield deflection almost at will and the was my teams “Kryptonite” tonight. Starman’s jujitsu that adds a token happened at least three times tonight. That’s so disheartening for your opponent, especially when it happens to their 250 point WOL026 Sodam Yat.
- WOL026 Sodam Yat is good as long as you pay the full point value, but his offense isn’t that great until you get to the Ion clicks. I remember playing him several times in month 3 just wanting opponents to do damage to him so that I could play the Ion clicks and finally be able to KO someone. I turned the tables and gave my opponents that feeling this tournament.
- People have been saying WOL038 Dex-Starr isn’t worth the points he costs, but after seeing him in action I tend to disagree. His defenses are top notch and his Penetrating Poison starts with an easy push to click 2. Add to that the fact that he can be carried by just about anyone and Dex-Starr seems like a winning piece to me.
- I didn’t give SLOSH046 Superboy the credit he deserved in my SLOSH top 10. He’s a very competent attacker and his ability to grant Willpower to adjacent figures can make teams like the one I played much better. 18 with invincible to start with is very good. I’d definitely play him again.
- Apparently the SLOSH set was the most over powered set to come out recently. Doubt me? Ask the ROC Champion or the HeroClix World Champion (You’ll definitely get the same answer from both since they are the same guy).
Critical Missives 